Jemina PearlBreak It Up
Ecstatic Peace
CD
For those of you who may not know who Jemina Pearl is, she was the lead singer of the short-lived and wonderfully exuberant Nashville punk band Be Your Own Pet. BYOP was raucous, fun, and had songs about food fights, safety pins, and zombies. While a very young band (members were in their late teens and early twenties), they had boatloads of attitude and the chops to back it up. The first release by any of the members since the break-up, Break It Up (purely coincidental and unintentional) continues Jemina Pearl's slow vocal maturation a la Karen O becoming less of a yeller and screecher and adding more actual singing to her repertoire. What happens is a bit of a mixed bag.
In BYOP tradition, there is a classic song title recycled for a brand new, lesser tune. Like BYOP's "Stairway To Heaven,", "Band On The Run," doesn't come close to living up to the original but it is entirely unrelated. While this doesn't quite live up to the efforts of her previous band, Break It Up does have some real gems like the duet with Iggy Pop and "Undesirable," which lead me to believe that Miss Pearl does have a future on her own. The album as a whole, while not spectacular, is really fun and has some truly enjoyable moments.
Track Grades
- Heartbeats – 8.5
- After Hours – 7.4
- Ecstatic Appeal – 8.6
- Band On The Run – 8.2
- I Hate People (feat. Iggy Pop) – 9.0
- Looking For Trouble – 7.2
- Retrograde – 7.5
- Nashville Shores – 6.6
- No Good – 7.7
- D Is For Danger – 7.3
- Selfish Heart – 8.4
- Undesirable – 9.2
- So Sick! – 7.9
Overall=7.96
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